by Pike, JJ
Black out.
The motion of the vehicle was erratic; side to side as well as front to back. Michael wanted to lift his hand to signal he was going to retch, but he was secured fast to the deck. Chopper. He was in a helicopter. That was the only explanation for the rush of frigid air and the rocking motion.
A metal hand wrenched the mask off his face, suctioned his mouth, sluiced it with a vile concoction that was three-parts bitters to one-part lemon. The salivary response had to be deliberate. They were dosing him. He thrashed in the dark, but with his arms and legs bound and head secured to a backboard, all he managed was a light arching of his back and a crick in his neck.
The mask was back over his face. His sleeve rolled up. He blinked the dark out of his eyes. To no avail. The needle went in, but he saw neither the injector nor the injectable. The soporific rolled up his arteries and into his brain where it blotted out all sense and reason.
He wasn’t Michael, he was Mickey.
Ten.
Maybe younger.
Yes, younger. Seven.
But…like his mother said when she found him and thrashed some sense into him.
Old enough to know better.
Old enough to know he wasn’t supposed to hide in a cupboard when he heard the unmuffled engine roar up the street in the middle of the day and disgorge itself of the slicked-back, smooth-talking, gin-swilling lothario.
Old enough to see the perfidious sneak-thief who stole his mother’s heart but sneaky enough to take care that he not be seen in return.
But he had been. Seen. Dragged out by the back of his shirt. His legs whipped. She’d never taken the belt to him before. But she did that day, showering him with words he’d only heard on forbidden television shows, late at night. Bad words. Big words. Grown up words. Words that said she was disgusted with him and would whip him raw if she caught him spying on her again.
Worse if he told.
Much worse.
That was the moment that had decided him. He’d watch and learn. Not be seen. Not trust women.
But he had. Just once. Let his guard down. Let her in: Fran, the ultimate traitor.
And it had been his downfall.
Not only his.
The whole world.
Francesca Hernandez, aka Eloise Farmanday, had snuck into his life and wound herself around his heart and made him tell her things he wasn’t supposed to tell and used it against him.
He didn’t know why.
What had he ever done to her?
Nothing.
He’d been a decent lover and a better friend.
She’d sold him out and splattered her brains over a tree near Alice’s house when she was in danger of being discovered.
That was always the trick; don’t be discovered.
Don’t let anyone see you, Mickey.
Don’t let anyone know who you are, Michael.
Don’t.
No, really. Don’t.
He swam against the rip tide but it sucked him out to sea and plunged him into the beautiful brine-y where tigers tap-danced and a rocket-fueled bed brought Angela Lansbury to the rescue. He knew how this one ended; this, in the age of not believing. The army, in its chain mail and suits of armor, rose from the dead and marched against the Nazi hordes.
But he was the enemy now and they’d come for him.
The vomit rose again. But this time when he blinked his eyes worked and fed him data.
Hospital. Walls, windows, white sheets, nurses. Old-fashioned drip, with a glass bottle and rubber tubing. Steel trolleys on wheels squeaking up and down the ward.
Screams.
Curtains.
“Crash cart.”
Feet. Lots of feet. Humans running by. No more metal soldiers. White coats. Doctors this time. Piling in. A hundred million of them like ravenous doves landing on a single piece of bread. Rabid. Raging. Plunging knives into a chest and cranking it open with a sharp-toothed chest-spreader, blood dripping off the bed and onto the floor. Hands in, pumping for the heart. Or extracting the alien. Maybe? They were mad to save this one. Why? When there were so many dead? Why this one?
Watch. Watch. Watch and learn.
His view obstructed.
His own nurse lowering over him. Frowning. “Not for you, Mr. Rayton. You’ve been a naughty boy. No peeking.” Big needle. Sleeve up. Mouth too thick and slow. Tongue not cooperating.
Black.
And on it went, these waves of consciousness and blackout. It wasn’t hard to know where he was, but the why of it escaped him.
A man at the foot of his bed. Three. Three men and one woman. Two of them white coats, two of them green uniforms. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. They had his chart. No nurse. No syringe. No putting him out again. He struggled to sit up.
“Dr. Rayton.” First doctor. Red hair. Freckles. The rosy cheeks of the genetically unfortunate. “I see you’re feeling better.”
He felt like shit.
“How many fingers?”
He wanted to say, “I’ll show you fingers,” but his mouth was a decade or two slower than his mind.
“Good.” The red headed, condescending white coat wrote something down. “A couple more days and we’ll have you out of here.”
“Fit for duty?” Green uniform asked.
Of course. That explained it. They were pumping him full of steroids so they could send him back to the war. Front lines; not covert ops; they were fitting him up to take part in the bang-bang crap that was sure to get you killed. Tell them, Rayton. Tell them who you are. Explain that you know things that are useful. Tell them about your operational mandate. Get yourself away from the green uniforms that end in pinewood boxes. Tell them. He moved his lips—friggin’ awesome, forward motion, progress—but, no sound.
“You rest.” The doctor crooked his little finger and the nurse came running.
“No.” It was the first word Michael had uttered in days and it cost him everything he had, but they took no notice of his protest.
Big needle. Big vial. Lots of knock-out-drops. More hallucinations. Not what he wanted.
“You won’t feel a thing,” she said. “Now, be a good boy. No more Mr. Pottymouth from you.”
Darkness. Lighter than the blackout darkness, but still medically induced sleep.
Gather yourself, Rayton. You know how to resist. Get your Fluffy Angus going and get yourself out of this. Because if you’ve talked while you’ve been under, you’re going to pay.
Michael Rayton’s training as a CIA operative meant he had learned how to wall off parts of his consciousness. As a ploy. To make sure he wouldn’t spill classified data when under interrogation. Nothing was fool-proof. There was no Bourne-brainwashing-don’t-know-who-I-am program (though he wished there was). It was just Michael Rayton and the force of his will. He would not think about the things he wasn’t supposed to think about and, as a direct result, none of those things would come out of his mouth.
When he woke Alice was in a wheelchair at his bedside.
No Angela Lansbury. No aliens leaping from patient’s chests. No flocks of doctors pecking out the eyes of their patients.
Just Alice.
Not what he’d expected.
The ward was quiet. Three beds beside him, empty. Dead or moved to another ward? Did it matter?
“We were extricated.” She pushed her hair off her face and tucked it behind her ear. “Don’t speak unless you must. We’re prisoners. I don’t know who has us or why, but keep your mouth shut and we’ll work out how to get out of here.”
Michael reached for the water on his bedside table.
Alice pushed herself out of her chair, poured a yellow liquid from the jug to the metal cup, and held it to his lips. “Drink.”
He shook his head.
She bent in close. “They say it’s vitamin enriched. Who the hell knows? We’re here. We do what we must to learn what we must, then we get the hell out. Agreed?”
He drank. When he didn’t black out, he drank s
ome more. He pushed himself up onto his pillows and took stock. He was in a makeshift hospital. Based on the arch of the ceiling it read like a refurbished hangar. Made sense. Someone had been paying attention. No plastic. This was good. To his left was a nurses’ station. To his right three beds and a wooden door.
“You remember much?” said Alice.
He shook his head.
“We were headed to Indian Point.”
That rang a bell. Indian Point. Nuclear Power Station close to New York City. Ah, shit. It was in meltdown. What had Baxter called it? “Chernobyl, times ten.”
“Now we’re not?” Holy moly, a full sentence. He was feeling better, just like the doc had said.
“When you’re street-ready—their phrase, not mine—we’ll be briefed.”
“We?”
“You, me, Baxter, and Hoyt.”
“I’m ready.” Michael swung his legs out from the bed and tried to stand. Bad idea. He fell forward. Alice wasn’t strong enough to hold him and the two of them crumpled to the floor.
His nurse—younger than he remembered, prettier too—was there, untangling them, helping him up.
The nurse shooed Alice down the ward and out the door, tucked Michael into bed, and handed him a menu. “I’m going to recommend something light and easy on your stomach. No steak and fries or chocolate lava cake for you for a few more days.”
Lunch came. He managed a few mouthfuls of soup, under the nurse’s supervision; like he was seven again, but minus the whipped legs. There were no clocks on the wall. No calendars. He didn’t know if he’d been in the hospital bed for a month or a year. “What day is it?”
She laughed. It was a pleasing, tinkling sound. One that made him want to curl up and let her take care of him. That was when he knew his defenses were down. He pointed his toes repeatedly, just to flex muscles she couldn’t see and keep himself alert.
“Everyone asks the same thing. ‘What day is it?’ But does that mean anything? It’s Tuesday. Does that help?”
He grinned. She was right. They’d been in a temporal haze, days running together in a stream of “find fresh water” and “take these pills” and “keep marching, we’re almost there.”
“What you should ask,” she said, “Is ‘how long have I been here’ or ‘when do I move out of the ward?’”
She was so much nicer than the nurse who’d been threatening to give him a shot. It was starting to come back. He stashed the thought. Inoculation theories were for later. Right now he was going to enjoy being in the company of a clean, cute, well-spoken young woman whose attention was concentrated on him. He would indulge her. He smiled his best, most charming smile. “How long have I been here?”
“A long time! Does that help?” She took his bowl and offered him a plate of toast. He waved it away. Her hair curled right into the nape of her neck. Couple of kisses, right there…and a hand on her breast and he’d be well on his way to being a happy boy. “You came in right before my shift last Thursday.”
Michael shot up in his bed. “A week? Not months?”
“That’s the concussion talking. You’ve been in and out.” She took his wrist, found his pulse, and checked the dinky watch clipped over her left breast.
The doors opened at the far end of the ward. A waft of fresh air, heavy with the scent of cut grass. Four uniforms and one white coat this time. The same red-headed doctor. “He’s all yours. Tip-top condition. The third to make it through.”
Michael’s nurse bundled him into a wheelchair, telling him to “be good,” and handed him off to his new command.
He kept his mouth shut tight. He was still altered. He needed to stay on high alert, take in his surroundings, work out what was going on.
Out in the field, heading south (on their fake mission, he reminded himself) the days had felt like weeks, the weeks like decades. Now that he was in a clean, well-ordered environment time had done a one-eighty. How could a few days feel like weeks (or months; he really had no sense of how much time had passed)?
One doctor pushed his chair while the others flanked him. They stayed behind him where he couldn’t see them. Deliberate. Orchestrated. Who were they? WhoWhatHow?
The sunlight was blinding.
The grass had been mowed, the flower beds tended, the trees pruned. The wildness of the woods upstate had been replaced with order and decorum. There were miniature houses dotted along the edge of the football field. Single-story units with red-brick exteriors and slate roofs. Dollhouses. Made for someone’s backyard. Playhouses for the kids. But high end. Very sturdy. Solid. No windows, though. And no chimneys. So, not like the English houses he’d drummed up in his mind. Nor dollhouses. Not for play.
There were seven in total, though as they got closer he could see that was just the first row. There were many more miniature houses behind the first set. No amount of bashing his gray cells against what he was seeing led him to any conclusions. They’d been built recently. Custom-made. No windows meant they were dark inside. Small enough to house…what? Ten foot by ten foot, they could barely house a man, his bed, and his bucket. They were prison units. Single cells. Designed to keep them apart.
Infection?
Sedition?
Prison break plans?
WhoWhatWhereWhenHow? Keep thinking. And in the absence of sense, keep trying to string a coherent thought together.
Why were they being kept apart?
His escorts didn’t speak. The clacking of their shoes spoke for them. Wooden soles. Good work around. Noisy, but MELT-resistant. The hands of time—fickle damned beasts—were inching backwards: clothing was strictly cotton, linen, wool and silk; footwear had to be made of wood and leather; housing was brick; transportation by horse and buggy.
That wasn’t a mirage. There was a pair of horses and they were pulling an Amish-style buggy.
But they’d brought him here in a helicopter. They—whoever “they” might turn out to be—were allowed access to the modern world.
The door to the little brick house glinted. Steel. With rivets. Someone wasn’t going to be getting out in a while.
That someone was him.
He couldn’t outrun them. He was still too weak.
“Dr. Rayton.” The military doctor stepped in front of the door, arms folded over his chest. “This is not pleasant for any of us. You understand the need for testing. And secrecy. This makes you a valuable asset.”
“Where am I?” Rayton wanted to draw the conversation out as long as possible. If he kept them talking he could come up with a plan. He always had. He never allowed himself to be cornered.
“Where isn’t important. Why, on the other hand…”
“Why am I here, then?”
“There’s reason to believe you may be MELT-resistant.”
“I am?”
“There’s a small handful of you. All Klean & Pure employees…” He waited. Michael had nothing to add, so he waited for the next clog to drop. “We need to run one final barrage of tests to make sure you’re not carriers.”
“Who else? Who else is immune?” He had his suspicions, but he needed to hear it from them.
“Alice Everlee. Christine Baxter. Jan van Karpel. And Josephine Morgan”
“Jan van Karpel is alive?”
“The tests are invasive. For which we apologize. But once you’re cleared you’ll be medevacked to a secure location where you’ll be briefed and released for further action.”
The door to Michael’s cell opened from the inside. What greeted him was from another century. Or some warped mind. A fetishist’s dream, wrapped entirely in leather, held out their hand.
“How invasive?”
No one answered.
What choice did he have? If he ran he’d be captured and court martialed. No saying what the rule of law was now. He might be shot if he refused to go inside.
He stood, took one last look at the bright, neat world, then stepped into the dark cell.
CHAPTER TWENTY
MARCH 2022
They passed through all three chambers of sick bay without drawing attention to themselves. There was only one patient remaining, her bed wedged against the far wall, Nurse Patrice tending to her drip. The place had been evacuated in record time. Triple-H must have told Patrice to discharge her non-critical patients in preparation for the big push. Didn’t matter if you had a broken wrist. You could go home your bones were the problem. Not contagious.
Jacinta was flooded with a craving for home. Real home. Not “outside the cave system” or “before this had all happened” or any place she’d lived in her whole adult life. She wanted to be home-home where someone would have already bound her wrist and whisked her over to the ER to have it splinted or put in a cast while they kissed her booboos. Home, where she had chores and homework and tasks linked to her weekly allowance but didn’t have responsibility for decision making or other people’s lives.
She’d been safe once. She’d had a tiger mom and a helicopter dad and her rebellion against all that smothering had been to latch on to Alistair and run dangerous ops at his behest. It had seemed like freedom—doing his bidding as they created a whole new way of living from scratch—until he was gone and she was in charge. Then she saw it for what it was: A crutch. She’d never stepped out on her own and it showed. Here she was, on the verge of doing what she believed to be right, and WHAM! it had been taken away from her by a clutch of ambitious, conniving men who thought they knew better than her. So humiliating. To be so close and still not manage to cut her mother’s apron strings or get out from under her daddy’s shadow. She was eternally the baby of the family and not to be trusted with anything “too dangerous.”
Snatches of song, high and thin, wafted from the door at the far end of sickbay. She’d banned radios and all other modes of electronic communication for a reason. They didn’t need to be gorging themselves on bad news from the outside world. They all knew what was going down and how regular folks were going to be freaking out and making things worse. If anyone could find a contraband radio it was going to be Triple-H. At least he had it tuned to a music broadcast, rather than that news channel Alistair had been addicted to. H had ignored her orders but for wholesome rather than perfidious reasons. Triple-H wasn’t anything like this traitor, Dominic Casey, at her back.
